Veru Announces the Appointment of Louis Aronne MD as Chief Medical Advisor for its Enobosarm Program for High Quality Weight Loss - Seite 2

Dr Aronne has served as a consultant/advisor to many companies developing treatments for obesity including Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (USA), Mediflix Inc. Pfizer, Inc., Altimmune, Inc., Amgen, Inc., Eli Lilly and Company, Janssen Pharmaceutical Company, Novo Nordisk Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Senda Biosciences, and Versanis Bio.*

“The weight loss and health benefits of the new generation of anti-obesity medications, the GLP-1 receptor agonists, are clear. Weight loss through any modality produces muscle loss, and there is an unmet need to minimize that in certain groups of patients in order to produce better quality weight loss. In conjunction with a GLP-1 drug, enobosarm has the potential to deliver better quality weight loss while utilizing lower doses of the GLP-1 drug. This should not only produce fewer side effects and better functioning, but potentially lead to longer term maintenance of weight loss.”

“We are pleased that Dr. Aronne, a world-renowned obesity expert, will be our Chief Medical Advisor to help us develop enobosarm as a treatment for chronic weight management,” said Mitchell Steiner, M.D., Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Veru Inc. “Enobosarm is a drug candidate that may provide higher quality weight loss for obese or overweight patients by preferentially increasing fat loss while preserving muscle. We are fortunate that Dr. Aronne and the other senior expert members of our Scientific Advisory Board will help guide the enobosarm development program.”

About Sarcopenic Obesity

According to the CDC, 41.5% of older adults have obesity in the United States and could benefit from a weight loss medication. Up to 34.4% of these obese patients over the age of 60 have sarcopenic obesity. This large subpopulation of sarcopenic obese patients is especially at risk for taking GLP-1 drugs for weight loss as they already have critically low amount of muscle due to age-related muscle loss. Further loss of muscle mass when taking a GLP-1 RA medication may lead to muscle weakness leading to poor balance, decreased gait speed, mobility disability, loss of independence, falls, bone fractures and increased mortality which is a condition like age-related frailty. Because of the magnitude and speed of muscle loss while on GLP-1 RA therapy for weight loss, GLP-1 RA drugs may accelerate frailty in older obese or overweight elderly patients.